Effective 1 January 2024, the Czech Energy Act (No. 458/2000 Coll.; "EA") mandates notification to the Ministry of Industry and Trade for both direct and indirect acquisitions of elements of energy critical infrastructure. The parties will be under a standstill obligation until the transaction is cleared. Notably, the triggering event is set to 10 % of shares or voting rights or even lower. Let's take a closer look at the new transaction review feature.

Despite their undeniable awareness of importance of intellectual property (IP) for business success, many multinational companies overlook the fact that IP laws vary between countries. This has motivated us to write this article as a memento of IP that can be generated by employees. It explains the general regime related to use of such intellectual property and suggests which legal mechanisms are available to employers in safeguarding their legitimate interests in relation to IP.

Regulation (EU) 2023/956 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 10 May 2023 (the “Regulation”) establishes a carbon border adjustment mechanism. The Regulation imposes new obligations on importers of selected goods from third countries into the EU. The aim of this article is to help entrepreneurs identify whether the Regulation applies to them and, if so, what are the most important obligations it imposes on them.

By Decision No. 361 dated 24 November 2023, the Parliament decided to extend the emergency state on the entire territory of the Republic of Moldova for 30 days, starting on 1 December 2023.

On 15 June 2021, the Hungarian Parliament passed Act C of 2021 on Land Registration that was supposed to enter into force on 1 February 2023. As this deadline neared, it became evident that neither private citizens, companies, lawyers nor authorities were adequately prepared for the change.

A long-awaited amendment to the Czech Medicines Act came into force on 1 January 2024. What practical impact will it have?

With the decision published in the Capital Markets Board Bulletin dated 29.12.2023 and numbered 2023/82 ["Decision"], the amounts subject to revaluation in the Capital Markets Law No. 6362 and related regulations and other regulations were determined for the year 2024.

On 1 January 2024, an amendment to the Labour Code came into force that introduces final liability of the construction contractor for wage claims filed by third parties against its subcontractors. This includes wage claims from any employment agencies, up to the amount of the statutory minimum wage for each employee engaged in activities for the subcontractor.

Last year's "digital amendment" introduced many changes to Czech corporate law. But one change that is often overlooked is the amendment to the Czech Public Registry Act.

Once implemented, those initiatives will require significantly more efforts from parties involved in trade and foreign investments to ensure regulatory compliance. The pursued security aims will lead to enhanced monitoring, assessments and controls being put in place, which will have to be factored into a reframed regulatory compliance approach by affected parties.

By its decision dated 29 December 2023, the Serbian Competition Commission determined that the companies KTG Solucije and Eco Sense from the town of Subotica (in Serbia) entered into a restrictive agreement by colluding in public procurement procedures (i.e., bid rigging).

The new EU regulation on electronic evidence will enable law enforcement authorities from one EU member state to order service providers in other EU member states to surrender digital evidence. Providers who fail to comply within ten days or, in urgent cases, within eight hours, could face fines of up to two percent of their global group turnover.

Article 26 of the Industrial Property Law No. 6769 ("IPL") authorises the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office ("Office") to revoke trademarks in cases set out in the relevant article. According to IPL Article 192/1-(a), this provision was set to come into effect seven years from its publication date, i.e., 10 January 2024. Additionally, 4^th provisional article of the IPL stipulated that this authority would be enforced by the courts until that time. Thus, with the expiration of the aforementioned seven-year period, the authority for the administrative revocation of trademarks was passed from the civil courts to the Office as of 10 January 2024.

Anticipated completion of the European NIS2 Directive's integration into Czech law is set for late 2024, facilitated by the new Czech Cybersecurity Act (CSA) and associated decrees. This legislative shift will impact an estimated 6,000 to 10,000 Czech companies, formerly exempt from cybersecurity regulations, necessitating the adoption of measures for compliance. Since the CSA is a complex legal regulation, it is advisable to engage a spectrum of experts, extending beyond IT to include legal and compliance professionals, in this transformative process.

It is a common labour law problem in Hungary that in case the employee, due to medical reasons, becomes permanently unfit for the job he previously fulfilled, the employer does not amend or terminate the employment (the latter of which would entail an obligation to pay severance pay), but keeps the employee on “idle time” without giving him tasks and salary. In our article, we examine this issue in light of the recent decision of the Hungarian Supreme Court.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the agency responsible for regulating the securities markets and protecting investors in the U.S.A, granted approval to 11 spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds (ETF), in its Approval Order on 10 January 2024.

There has been much discussion about protracted shortages of critical medicines in the Czech Republic over the last couple of months. Many national measures have been adopted. At the European Union level,the Voluntary Solidarity Mechanism for medicines has been put in place.

In Hungary, a legal entity can separate into multiple legal entities through division or spin-off. In the case of a spin-off, the original legal entity continues to exist, and a portion of its assets is transferred to the newly formed legal entity as its successor.